


The Twenty-First Thing

by sheafrotherdon



Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-02-14
Updated: 2005-02-14
Packaged: 2017-10-11 23:27:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/118327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sheafrotherdon/pseuds/sheafrotherdon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sirius leaves a letter on Remus' pillow, Valentine's Day, Seventh Year</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Twenty-First Thing

Moony –

I've been making lists again.

I know, I _know_ – after McGonagall found the list of Twenty Ways To Use Empty GoblinFyre Bottles To Wreak General Mayhem And Generate A Sexual Frenzy, I promised I wouldn't make another list for at least six months.

But _Moony_. You were sucking on your quill.

I was sitting in Defense, actually paying attention for once (because – and feel free to quibble – learning how to avoid being killed seems like such a dastardly _good_ thing to know) and you started _sucking on your quill_. Have I mentioned that I like it when you suck on your quill? I like it a lot. I like it a great deal. I like it so much that it makes me want to do nefarious things to you in dark corners and on deserted staircases.

And that's how this started.

I started making a list of all the things I _like_ about you.

One of the things I like about you is that you get so very _embarrassed_ when I tell you I like you. So forgive me if I indulge in making you squirm, but here are the top twenty-one things I decided I liked about you today:

1) You get excited when there's tomato soup for dinner.  
2) You pull on your earlobe when you're embarrassed  
3) You've never yet managed to cut up potions ingredients without clasping your tongue between your teeth  
4) It took you until the end of sixth year to start to shave (which is bloody hilarious when you consider the way you look once a month. Well it _is_ , you hairy bastard)  
5) You lick all the salt and vinegar off your crisps before eating them  
6) You sharpen your quills with a frequency and precision that's honestly quite fanatical  
7) You rub your feet together as you're falling asleep  
8) You hum little songs when you're waking up (and have no idea you're doing it)  
9) You get annoyed _every time_ you have to brush your teeth  
10) You never apologize when you fart  
11) You pull your hands up inside your sleeves when you're worried  
12) You never split a KitKat down the middle, even though that's the way the universe _intended_ for KitKats to be eaten. Have you no respect for chocolate?  
13) You really enjoy picking your nose when you think no one's watching. Don't even try to deny it.  
14) You sing Elvis in the shower without even a modicum of proper shame  
15) You know Quidditch statistics going back to 1784  
16) You wore the same pair of socks every single day last week _and_ managed to blame James for the smell  
17) You kiss me like there's nothing else in the world worth doing and the way you _look_ at me right before you do? I . . . like that.  
18) You have the most perfect belly  
19) You have a mole on your right hipbone that _begs_ to be nibbled  
20) You whimper whenever I touch the back of your knees.  
21) You have the most bloody enormous big toes. It's not natural, to have toes like that, but I _like_ it, and that suggests I'm in an awful lot of trouble where you're concerned.

It's a lovely list isn't it? (Excuse me while I pause for a second to imagine just how badly you're blushing right now. Poor Moony, wriggling like a fish on a hook and threatening me with all kinds of harm under his breath. But I digress . . .)

The problem with the list was that it didn't stop there. If anyone ever comes after me with a combination kidney-popping, hair-burning, eyeball-bursting hex I am _doomed_ (unless someone tutors me on the subject, someone who'd like my kidneys to remain unpopped, someone who wouldn't mind me borrowing their notes because after all, I only missed _everything_ because I was thinking about _them_. I wonder who such a person might be . . . ) I started to think about the fact that I obviously like a lot of things about you, and really rather _esteem_ you. and all kinds of awful bollocks like that – and that got me to the day's second list. If Bad People Took Moony And It Was Up To Me To Do Something Heroic To Get Him Back, What Would I Be Prepared To Do?

1) I'd wear polyester  
2) I'd go two days without washing my hair  
3) I'd cheer for Ravenclaw at Quidditch  
4) I'd concede that James is more brilliant than me  
5) I wouldn't laugh when Wormtail told us how great he was at shagging  
6) I'd go an entire day -- _maybe even more_ – without cursing anyone (too badly)  
7) I'd say please and thank you and mind my manners  
8) I'd forgo my customary and satisfying belch at the end of every meal  
9) I'd only transfigure what I was told to in class, and resist the urge to pelt people with balled up pieces of levitated paper in Charms (which, quite frankly, seems a habit I'm never going to grow out of)  
10) I'd wear boxers instead of nothing, and indeed pants instead of boxers (do you _understand_ that sacrifice? M'bits do not like to be contained, Moony, not at all)  
11) _I'd be nice to Evans_. The idea alone makes me shudder, SHUDDER I tell you  
12) I'd stand on the High Table and apologize for (some of) the bad things I've done.  
13) I'd send my mother a birthday card that didn't contain the plague.  
14) I'd sleep with Violet "I could crush you like a bug, which is an unusual trait in a Hufflepuff" McPherson.  
15) I'd read poems written by Irish people  
16) I'd promise to never slide down the banisters ever again ( _oh_ , that makes my heart hurt, just the very _idea_ )  
17) I'd do my very, very best to stop staring at you when you're sleeping (but Moony, I'm so bloody addicted to your mumble of "st'pstarin'tme" when you wake up)  
18) I'd stay absolutely silent for twenty-four hours. I wish I could say I'd go longer but we all know I'd explode if I did  
19) I'd take up badminton (daftest Muggle invention ever)  
20) I'd voluntarily move to Birmingham

But then I got to Thing Number Twenty-One. That's when I realized I was in over my head in the Very Worst Way and I was unlikely to get _anything done ever again_. Because thing number twenty-one was . . . oh Merlin on a cabbage-free diet with gravy, _I have to write it down_ and you have _no idea_ the shooting pains this is sending up my shins.

21) I'd listen to disco

CLEARLY I'M TOTALLY FUCKING IN LOVE.

I'm now down by the lake contemplating drowning myself. I have umanned myself, spilled my guts, and generally realized I am your slave, all because _you sucked on your bloody quill_.

If you can see your way to coming and finding me, and perhaps telling me you think I might be a half-way decent catch if I worked on it diligently, I'd be in your debt forever. The lake looks _so very cold_ but death may be my only option if you don't like me a whole heck of a lot right back.

Not that I'm remotely high-strung or melodramatic.

(Although I am very good-looking. I throw that in just in case it helps you make your decision at all).

Yours – a big girlie coward who's leaving this on your pillow and running for his life,

Padfoot.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Thingamies, and their Consequences](https://archiveofourown.org/works/118322) by [sheafrotherdon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sheafrotherdon/pseuds/sheafrotherdon)




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